


A Thousand Years and then Some

by slstmaraudersjple



Category: The Originals (TV), The Vampire Diaries & Related Fandoms, The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Bill Forbes is like 70-ish and still a terrible father, Caroline is in denial, Caroline likes being a vampire, F/M, Klaus accidentally kills his soulmate, Klaus is smitten and utterly charmed, Non-Graphic Torture, Soulmate marks, Soulmates, The Mikaelsons are amused at Klaus, human!Caroline turns into a vampire, it's like being a superhero, no Freya, vampire!Caroline does good things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:06:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23774314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slstmaraudersjple/pseuds/slstmaraudersjple
Summary: "C'mon love, what's a little murder between soulmates?" Klaus discovers his soulmate as he kills her. Unbeknownst to him, she dies with vampire blood in her system and returns as a vampire. Unfortunately for him, she leaves Mystic Falls and spends the next couple centuries running from him. Never let it be said that they weren't stubborn. One-shot.Or, in which the Caroline and Klaus discover that they are soulmates when Klaus kills her, and a displeased newly born baby vampire spends the next couple centuries running from him and his family while living in denial. But the Mikaelsons play the long game, and they play for keeps… and that includes Caroline. Klaroline featuring the Mikaelson siblings (no Freya).
Relationships: Caroline Forbes/Klaus Mikaelson, Caroline Forbes/The Originals
Comments: 15
Kudos: 399
Collections: However Long It Takes





	A Thousand Years and then Some

**Author's Note:**

> ***This was first posted to FFN under the same username.***
> 
> I did borrow some dialogue from TVD and TO; those will be italicized and bolded. This… turned out a little differently from how I imagined it initially. I hope you enjoy it anyways! Feedback would be greatly appreciated.
> 
> Warnings: character deaths, some non-graphic torture.
> 
> Disclaimer: I don't own TVD or TO.

**A Thousand Years and then Some**

* * *

" ** _Love is a vampire's greatest weakness, and we are not weak, Elijah. We do not feel, and we do not care."_**

* * *

The last component to unlocking his curse, aside from the doppelganger: a human.

She was quite pretty, Klaus mused. Golden curls the color of sunshine and vivid blue eyes that contained an ocean within them. His hands itched for a pad and pencil so he could sketch her, and he briefly wondered what she would look like when she was glowing with joy, instead of looking at him with a curious combination of fear and resignation.

"Just don't hurt Elena." She said quietly, as he approached the circle of fire that held her. She looked at him, meeting his amused gaze with a stubborn glint in her eye and a surprising spark of confidence, and he found himself reluctantly impressed, a rare feat for a mere human to accomplish.

"You're not in any position to be making demands love, although I applaud your bravery." He placed two fingers under her chin, lifting her head to look her in the eye. "Unfortunately, you're what's known as collateral damage."

He heard the doppelganger crying in the background, trying to shout reassurances to the human, and the human girl only shook her head in response with a small smile.

"It's okay, Elena."

What a most curious little creature.

As he ripped his fangs into her neck and tasted her blood, the world exploded.

He found himself floating in a universe of starlight, felt unmeasurable power running through his veins, and he saw his future. The startling revelation hit him like an icy waterfall, and he tore his mouth away from her, looking at her with shock. The soulmate mark on his chest _burned_ , glowing a brilliant gold the color of her hair.

_This human girl was his soulmate._

He knew she'd felt the same thing, as she silently watched him with an expression that was accusing, betrayed, and heartbroken… and relieved. He felt her pulse slowly fade, watched the brightness in her eyes dimming until they finally closed, and listened as she stopped breathing.

Briefly horrified, he clutched her body to him, roared at the fickleness of the universe as he pawed at the sudden void in his chest, empty and painful and missing, as the soulmate mark on his chest faded. The only expression he could equate to this feeling was heartbreak.

_But was it possible to be heartbroken over someone you never knew?_

The witch needed to prompt him to continue the ritual, and he nearly ripped her head off before remembering why he needed her. He barely recalled the rest of the ceremony, the witch chanting as he drained the doppelganger and dropped her body.

And then it was over. He had done it.

He unlocked his werewolf side, freeing himself from the confines of his mother's curse.

But he had lost his soulmate in the process.

* * *

Hours passed before he began to experience a burning sensation.

He was so surprised he dropped his glass of bourbon, and it crashed to the floor in a thousand sparkling pieces.

He peeled off his shirt and stared in awe of the soulmate mark on his chest glowing, felt the bond flare to life, and came to the startling conclusion that somehow, miraculously, his soulmate was alive.

Klaus returned to the spot where he left her body, but she was nowhere to be found.

Furious, he shifted into a werewolf for the first time, his rage fueling his destruction of the nearby forest. His wolf howled at the loss of its soulmate, mourned being torn from her before it ever had the chance to meet her.

He woke up in the middle of a clearing, Elijah silently watching him from atop a tree. When their gazes met, his older brother threw down a set of clothing, neatly wrapped in plastic.

As he dressed himself, he snarled, "Find me everything there is to know about the human girl."

* * *

His soulmate was named Caroline Forbes. From her school records, she was a rather popular and well-liked girl: a straight-A student involved in a ridiculous number of extracurricular activities.

She had been sixteen years old when he killed her. But two days prior, she had been in a car accident that resulted in injuries so severe that only vampire blood could save her. She'd had vampire blood in her system when he killed her.

His soulmate was now a baby vampire who had all but disappeared, apparently determined to hide from him.

He passed time by sketching her as he remembered her, the way she looked at him with unfaltering courage even though she knew she was about to die.

He dreamt of sunshine and the ocean, and he faintly wondered if her lips were as soft as he imagined.

"You can run, but you won't be able to hide forever, little love," He murmured, tracing the lines of her curves in his sketches.

* * *

Caroline's transition to vampirehood was traumatic, to say the least. She'd abruptly woken up, shot up from where she was laying on the forest floor from where her soulmate killed her, instinctively reaching for the blood bags by her side and draining them.

Everything was so _loud_ , and she could feel it all.

Stefan had been leaning against a tree, watching her. He didn't say anything, silently gathering up the blood bags when she was finished. Then he gave her a crash course on vampirism, briefly covered some of her newfound abilities and gave her a couple warnings, and whisked her away to Bonnie under the cover of night. His last words to her were an apology, and that was the last time she spoke to him for a while.

 _Of course_ her soulmate was a thousand-year-old vampire-werewolf hybrid.

But Caroline Forbes had absolutely no intentions of sticking around to be another piece in his games. She was nobody's pawn, least of all her soulmate's.

* * *

She had never been on the run before, but thanks to crime scene television shows, she had an inkling of what to do (like never use your real name, don't share any legit info about yourself, lay low and don't draw attention to yourself, and take the SIM card out of your cell phone).

Getting out of Mystic Falls was easy; she only had two people to talk to: her mom and Bonnie, and they both understood. They cried together, and then they helped her leave. Her mom got her a thousand dollars emergency cash and a couple Visa gift cards, and an unused burn phone with a new SIM card. Bonnie made her a daylight ring and a bracelet that was spelled to make her untraceable, even to her asshat murderous soulmate, and slipped her the contact info for a couple of her witchy relatives who would be willing to help her. Bonnie also gave her a special cream to cover her soulmate mark with.

She packed a backpack with a couple changes of clothing and some of her treasured photos, and flashed out of Mystic Falls, determined to never return.

The entire time, she tried to ignore the burning sensation across her collarbone as her soulmate mark flared to life.

* * *

Sometimes, she had the worst luck.

It was her eighteenth birthday, and she impulsively decided to celebrate at a small local bar in a relatively quiet part of Louisiana about thirty minutes outside of New Orleans (she'd heard that NOLA was a hotbed for supernatural activity and was determined to avoid it at all costs), and of _course_ she got bit by a friggin' werewolf during a bar fight.

Caroline somehow made it back to her apartment, gritting her teeth from the pain, choking back sobs as she laughed at the irony of the situation.

She had been killed by her soulmate, only to be turned into a vampire to be killed by another werewolf barely two years later.

She briefly contemplated calling Bonnie, but knew that it wouldn't make a difference. It would be too late by the time her best friend arrived; the venom was spreading too quickly, the wound festering an angry red from infection.

There was no cure for a werewolf bite.

Caroline knew that she wouldn't make it through the night, and so, she resigned herself to her death. Again.

She made herself comfortable, threw on her favorite pajamas, and crawled into bed. She had started drifting off when a familiar voice commented, **_"Oh, that looks bad."_**

She struggled to open her eyelashes and found herself looking over at Klaus Mikaelson standing in her doorway. He looked the same, wearing jeans and a henley shirt, with fresh blood splatters on them.

Was she hallucinating already? Or was this death?

" ** _I love birthdays,"_** he mused.

" ** _Yeah, aren't you like, a billion or something?"_** She bit out. Her vision was blurring, and she was starting to see triple.

" ** _You're going to have to change your perception of time when you become a vampire, Caroline,"_** he murmured, stepping closer. There was an oddly enchanting quality to his voice as he continued, **_"Celebrate that you're no longer bound by trivial human conventions. You're free."_**

" ** _No,"_** she retorted, **_"I'm dying."_**

" ** _And I could let you die, if that's what you wanted."_** He responded calmly. **_"If you really believe that your existence has no meaning. I've thought about it myself, once or twice over the centuries, truth be told."_** He stopped in front of her, his voice dropping to a low lull as he cajoled, **_"But I'll let you in on a little secret. There's a whole world waiting for you. Great cities, art, and music. Genuine beauty. And you could have it all. You could have a thousand more birthdays. All you have to do is ask."_**

Caroline closed her eyes and bit the inside of her cheek, grimacing as a wave of pain overcame her. The werewolf bite pulsated. Dying had sucked the first time, and it wasn't any better the second time.

She couldn't stop the tear that escaped as she cried, **_"I don't wanna die."_**

She heard the sound of fang ripping through flesh, and smelled the scent of blood permeating the air. Klaus pressed his bloodied wrist to her mouth, and her vampire instincts took over as she gorged on his blood.

Her soulmate positioned himself behind her, his front pressed against her back as he supported her, his free hand caressing her hair as he murmured, **_"There you go, sweetheart. Have at it."_**

Once she drank her fill, she found herself succumbing to darkness, stress and exhaustion overtaking her body. He gently lowered her to her bed, and before she completely passed out, he said quietly, **_"Happy birthday, Caroline."_**

She closed her eyes, felt the faintest pressure on her forehead, and the world faded away.

When she woke up the next morning, he was gone, and there was a slim velvet box sitting on the nightstand.

She opened it with trembling fingers, and found a piece of paper wrapped around a vial of blood. She swallowed, carefully tucking the vial of blood away, before unrolling the piece of paper to reveal… a hand-drawn sketch. Of her, from the day he killed her. She was standing in the circle of flames, determination in her eyes. She looked beautiful and fierce, ethereal.

It was titled, _Genuine Beauty._

There was a note scrawled on the back of it: _Until we meet again, little love. -Klaus_

* * *

The next time she encountered him was two years later, in Athens.

"Fancy seeing you here, love."

She scoffed, ignoring him as she mixed drinks and passed them out to customers.

When her last customer was attended to, she finally turned to him, put on her best Miss Mystic Falls smile, and sweetly asked, "And what can I get started for you today?"

He glanced at her name tag, amusement on his features as he responded, "Surprise me… _Bonnie_."

She made him her least favorite drink on the menu, and he raised it up towards her in a toast as he took a sip, commenting, "Interesting selection."

She coolly responded, "It's called _Major Fuck-ups By Asshats_. Maybe you've heard of it."

He smiled in response, his smug dimples making an appearance as he said, "C'mon love, what's a little murder between soulmates?"

She didn't speak to him the rest of the time he was there, refused to give him the satisfaction of knowing that he got under her skin, and he didn't say another word.

He left her a ridiculously hefty tip, and another sketch.

This time, it was of her, sitting at the bar in Louisiana before the fight broke out. She'd been chatting with the bartender, smiling and laughing.

This time, there was only one line scrawled at the bottom of the sketch: _Happy Birthday, Caroline._

And her traitorous heart skipped a beat.

* * *

It took her a couple decades – longer than she'd been alive – to really get the hang of living a nomadic lifestyle.

She'd learned to feed on humans – robbing hospitals was too risky, and stealing blood bags meant stealing from people who actually needed them – and compulsion, but only as necessary.

She learned how to invest her meager savings, how to find work, and how to establish herself into the networks of the cities she visited.

And how to avoid the supernatural, as much as possible.

Caroline found it rewarding to use her new gift of life as a vampire as a means to help others. She volunteered with the Red Cross, the Peace Corps, and any humanitarian organizations that caught her interest. She was careful to stay out of the spotlight, but found that she could still thrive and put her obsessive-compulsive organizational skills to use for the greater good. (It was almost like being a superhero, except she didn't have a cape and a moniker.)

And Klaus somehow always managed to find her. He showed up at the oddest places, at the most unexpected times, with no rhyme or rhythm to their encounters.

In Brazil, where she ran a domestic violence survivors' shelter. She threw a fundraiser gala to help expand their location, and he'd shown up with two other vampires who looked strikingly similar in appearance. She later learned that he had four other siblings – _wasn't just one of them enough?_ – and that Kol and Rebekah were his younger siblings. The three of them had mingled with guests, chatting amiably, although Kol and Rebekah threw curious glances over at Caroline's direction, which she did her best to ignore. However, when a rather handsy and affluent CEO asked her to dance, she found herself intercepted by the younger Mikaelson sibling, who threw a charming grin as he casually commented, "I do believe I was promised a dance first." By the end of the night, her fundraiser gala exceeded their original goal threefold.

In Africa, where she helped build a series of schoolhouse campuses for orphaned girls. He didn't say a word as he silently helped her with the completion of the two schoolhouses and four residential buildings. Rebekah had shown up abruptly, demanded to speak to the governor of the region, and returned three days later with two teams and impressively high quality supplies to reinforce the structures of the buildings. The female Original surprised Caroline when she took the time to teach the girls a series of basic self-defense classes. Klaus watched Caroline interact with the children as he painted the walls. He left her with a generous donation for the schools.

In Hong Kong, where she taught English at a homeless shelter for adults. He showed up with his older brothers Finn and Elijah, posing as visiting scholars. Elijah ensured that each and every single member of her class received a work-appropriate outfit, while Finn reviewed resumes and gave practice interview questions. Afterwards, they surprised her class with a business luncheon with lucrative business personnel looking to hire _and_ an end-of-term all-expenses-paid trip to London, to practice their English.

Her soulmate never said much, always watching her with an intense, unreadable expression.

But he always contributed to her championed causes and left her a sketch with a short note written beneath it.

Caroline tried not to think too much about what his actions and gestures could mean, but sometimes, she dreamt of touching his ridiculously charming dimples and kissing him.

If Caroline had to be honest with herself, she didn't _really_ hold it against her soulmate for murdering her. Like, yeah it sucked. But having access to all the awesome perks of vampirism in exchange for a regular diet of blood seemed like a fair tradeoff.

She believed him when he told her that she was _collateral damage_. He didn't even know who she was at the time. And the tidbits of information she put together told her that he had been cursed, his werewolf side bound, so that he had never felt whole. She thought that it must have be so lonely to never be able to be yourself, and wondered if she would've done the same thing, if she'd been in his shoes.

Sometimes, when it was a full moon and she heard wolves howling in the distance, she briefly wondered if her soulmate was out there, running through the woods and enjoying his freedom.

* * *

His soulmate made for a glorious monster. She had the most impressive self-control out of any vampire he'd ever met; as far as he knew, she'd only killed in self-defense, and to protect others. She fed from the worst of humanity - the mortal scum who hid in the shadows and liked to prey on the weak; his soulmate had no tolerance for such actions.

Of all the monsters he knew, he should have known that Caroline Forbes would never lose her spark of humanity.

She was a true queen, a champion of just causes, and a savior of humankind.

He found himself completely and utterly charmed by her, and he knew that his family was amused by the lengths he was willing to go to check up on his little soulmate.

Still, they supported him by accompanying him whenever he went, even if they smirked at each other with knowing grins as they watched him make donation after donation to the various causes she championed.

Unfortunately for him, his little soulmate appeared to be oblivious to his efforts to woo her.

Either that, or she was in a deep state of denial.

_Perhaps he should try to be more obvious?_

* * *

According to the world, Caroline Forbes was dead. Her mother forged the appropriate paperwork and death certificate. They held a funeral for her in Mystic Falls.

But that meant that Caroline was free, in a way that she'd never been before. She was no longer confined to a small-town life. Once upon a time, she dreamt of growing up and getting married in Mystic Falls.

But now, she had the world at her fingertips, and she refused to settle for anything less.

She videochatted with her mother and Bonnie as often as she could, even if their calls were often short, but they kept her grounded, and Caroline was grateful for them.

She occasionally met up with Bonnie, and they went on a spontaneous adventure someplace new each time. During those times, Bonnie would update her on the supernatural (or not) drama, and they would exchange gossip on each other's lives.

Her mother would visit on occasion, flying into a random country, only to sneak into _another_ country where Caroline would wait for her. They would spend anywhere from a couple days to a week together before her mom returned to Mystic Falls.

Even though her mom was still getting used to the idea of her only daughter being a vampire, Liz had mentioned several times how glad she was that at least Caroline could take care of herself. Mother and daughter had never been closer, and it was times like that, that Caroline was thankful for being a vampire.

* * *

Caroline returned to Mystic Falls thirty years after she left, when Bonnie called to inform her that her mother was shot in the line of duty, and was currently in the hospital in the ICU.

She compelled herself the first flight possible, but she was too late. Liz Forbes' injuries were too critical, and she had died shortly after going into surgery.

Bonnie gave the eulogy as Caroline hid in the shadows, silently crying, her heart breaking.

_She never got to say goodbye._

She was so lost in her grief that she never saw the figure behind her, the glint of the needle before it sank into her neck, and her world went black.

She woke up, chained to a chair, her skin burning from the vervain-soaked chains.

"I didn't believe it until I saw it with my own two eyes." A voice she hadn't heard in almost forty years spoke, and a familiar figure stepped out from the shadows, looking similar but aged thirty years, holding a gun.

"Daddy?" She choked out, struggling to breathe through the stench of vervain in the air as it burned her lungs.

Bill Forbes slowly held up the gun, pointing it towards her. "This is for your own good, Care-bear."

He pulled the trigger.

She screamed, not noticing her soulmate bond flaring to life.

* * *

Pain seared through the soulmate bond, drawing Klaus' attention away from the vampire he was currently torturing. He startled, reaching up a hand to touch his soulmate mark.

For a brief moment, he saw through Caroline's eyes, felt her confusion and pain and fear, saw the figure standing before her, and heard her whispered word that made his blood boil: _"Daddy?"_

His soulmate was in danger.

He and his siblings had already been on their way to Mystic Falls – Kol and Elijah were coming on a separate flight, but Finn and Rebekah were with him – since receiving word that his soulmate's mother had been killed.

His oldest brother noticed the glint in his eyes and the clench of his teeth, and calmly asked, "What do you wish of us, Niklaus?"

"Someone took Caroline." He gritted out. "She mentioned her father. Find her and kill the ones who took her and everyone they know."

"Sage is already in Mystic Falls." Finn responded. "I'll send word to her."

"I'll let 'Lijah and Kol know." Rebekah added.

* * *

They took her daylight ring.

At first, the sunlight burned.

But then it stopped.

Bill Forbes observed the mark on her collarbone and commented, "You have a soulmate. Not a vampire, which explains why you have some sunlight immunity. You should really apologize to them when this is over – did you know that soulmates can sense each other's pain? Not all the time, but when it hurts enough to override natural psychic defenses."

And then he shot her twice in the leg with a vervain-laced wooden bullet.

She screamed again.

Oh God, it hurt so much.

"Why do you hate what I am so much?" She cried. "I didn't choose to become a vampire, but I help people. I'm good, daddy."

"But people will never be safe around you." Bill Forbes shook his head, opening the box he brought with him and taking out a blood bag. "Not as long as you drink this."

He unscrewed the bag, squirting it all over the room.

Weakened, her self-control slipped, and her monster came roaring out, fangs lunging.

"See what I mean?" Bill asked, shooting her in her side.

"Please, daddy, I promise I'm good," she choked out, sobbing, struggling to contain her monster.

"Let's try this again." Bill Forbes said, ignoring her.

Another blood bag.

Another bullet.

How was her world falling apart so fast? Her mother was dead and the only living relative she had left hated her for who she was, for something she had no choice in.

The fresh pain of losing her mother hurt so much. The pain of losing her father hurt too, but the pain of her father telling her how much he hated her, torturing her and treating her like a monster… it hurt more.

She vaguely wondered where Bonnie was, if Bonnie knew what was happening to her.

She wondered if Bonnie would find her body.

She briefly wondered if her soulmate would care.

"Just tell me who the vampires are and I'll give you a mercy killing, Caroline."

"I haven't lived here for thirty years," she sobbed.

"Who turned you into a vampire?"

"I don't know!"

"How did you die?"

" _MY SOULMATE KILLED ME!"_ She screamed, unable to hold back the anguish in her voice. _"He killed me and he realized too late, and it doesn't matter anymore."_

Bill Forbes paused momentarily.

* * *

Sage, Elijah, and Kol had already dispatched of the vampire hunters when Klaus, Finn, and Rebekah landed. Sage greeted them at the airport landing strip.

"She's at the old jailhouse." His brother's soulmate stated, gesturing for them to get into the black sedan as she continued, "Apparently, it was modified to be used to torture vampires. Elijah and Kol are waiting for you. They left a survivor."

They made it to the jailhouse in due time.

Elijah and Kol met them with matching grimaces, the survivor slumped at their feet, unconscious.

"Restrain yourself, Niklaus." Elijah cautioned.

At his brother's words, Klaus turned towards the building and listened.

" _How did you die?"_

" _MY SOULMATE KILLED ME!"_ Caroline screamed, her voice raw and full of anguish. _"He killed me and he realized too late, and it doesn't matter anymore."_

The other person paused for a moment and finally commented, _"Well, I suppose that's fortunate then, because it looks like you won't be missed. After all, who's going to mourn someone who died thirty years ago?"_

The sounds of Caroline sobbing brought out his wolf, and his eyes glowed golden as he started towards the direction of the voices.

He stopped, looking over at his family for a moment before finally stating, "Kol. You will come with me and get Caroline out of here. Bring her to our mansion and leave her with Bekah. Sage, go get some blood bags. B+ if you can. Finn and Elijah… clean up the bodies."

His family nodded in agreement, moving to accomplish their assigned tasks, and Kol followed after him with the survivor as they headed into the jailhouse.

Klaus heard the sound of a gun being cocked, and he blurred when he heard the sound of the trigger being pulled.

He smashed through the door to the chamber Caroline was in, grabbing the bullet midair as he unceremoniously slammed Bill Forbes into the wall and snapped the gun in half.

Caroline was slumped over in a chair, chains wrapped around her holding her in place as her head drooped to one side. There was blood dripping down her torso and legs from various bullet wounds, and the air stank of vervain.

"Caroline?" He murmured.

"Please, daddy, I promise I'm good," she sobbed, delirious from the pain. She didn't appear to recognize him.

He snapped the chains holding her in place, carefully picked her up, slipped her daylight ring back on, and deposited her in Kol's arms after he dropped the survivor at his feet.

"Take care of her, brother." He murmured.

His brother silently nodded and was gone with a blur.

Once Kol left with Caroline, Klaus turned to Bill Forbes and the surviving vampire hunter, waiting for them to wake up.

It didn't take long, as he forced vampire blood down their throats.

When he had their attention, he smiled at them darkly. "Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Niklaus Mikaelson. Perhaps you've heard of me?" When the men blanched, he continued, "You see, the reason I'm here is because I learned that my soulmate is in danger. Perhaps you've heard of her? Her name is Caroline Forbes." If possible, they paled even further, and he grinned, showing his fangs. "You have? Good. Because you dared to touch what is mine and now **_I'm gonna kill each and every last one of you._ "**

* * *

Caroline was floating. It didn't feel like she was chained to a chair anymore, but that could be because of the pain.

Was she dying?

Third time's the charm, right?

She should have died when she was sixteen. She should have died when she was eighteen. And now, she was forty-six. Forty-six was a good life, right? About half of an average lifespan, but twice as long as medieval ages. She'd done some good. She lived some.

But she hadn't fallen in love yet.

She heard voices and frowned when she couldn't make out if they were her memories.

_There was pain. So much pain._

_"We need to get the bullets out so she can heal." A female voice said solemnly._

_"Try blood first." A male voice responded._

_Wetness touched her lips, and a female voice yelled, "Drink, goddamnit, Caroline!"_

" _Try the vial of Nik's blood." A male voice said quietly._

" _What vial?"_

" _He left her a vial after he cured her of the werewolf bite."_

_The female scoffed. "How romantic."_

" _Considering how he tortured and killed that werewolf and entire pack afterwards, and strung up their intestines on the outskirts of New Orleans? That's Nik for you. Stupid wanker didn't even have the guts to tell his soulmate he had feelings for her."_

_Someone parted her lips and poured a familiar tasting liquid down her throat. She choked, swallowing. When wetness touched her lips again, it was easier to swallow, but she grimaced at the taste, trying to push away from it._

You're a monster, Bill Forbes taunted her. MonsterMonsterMonsterMonsterMonster.

_There was the sound of liquid splashing, and colorful cursing._

_Then there were sounds of a door bursting open, and a familiar voice asked, concerned, "How is she?"_

" _You try feeding her." The female voice responded with agitation. "She wouldn't drink from the blood bag, but she drank yours."_

_Hands lifted her up, and a comfortable weight pressed against her back, supporting her. Then there was the sound of flesh being ripped into, the tantalizing smell of delectable blood in the air, and when the wetness pressed against her lips, her monster reared its fangs as she gorged._

_A hand stroked her hair, and a voice murmured, "That's my girl."_

* * *

Caroline woke up screaming from nightmares of Bill Forbes shooting her with vervain-laced bullets.

"Caroline."

"No, daddy, I promise I'm good," She cried, curling up into a ball as she wrapped her arms around herself.

A weight settled next to her, and a hand touched her arm. "It's me, love."

Startled, Caroline opened her eyes and saw Klaus.

"Why are you here?"

"I felt your pain." He simply responded.

She didn't have a response for him, so she settled for a whispered, "Thank you."

"You're welcome, Caroline." He murmured, and said, "I believe you'll want to see her."

When Caroline looked at him with a questioning expression, he nodded towards the door. It burst open moments later, and Bonnie ran in, tears in her eyes. "Caroline! They" she jerked her head over at Klaus and said, "told me about your dad. I swear I didn't know. I'm so sorry!"

"Bonnie!" Caroline cried, shaking her head as she responded, "It's not your fault."

They didn't notice when Klaus quietly stepped out and closed the door behind him, to give the girls some privacy.

They stayed up reminiscing about their childhood and shared their fondest memories in honor of Liz.

Bonnie stayed the night, sleeping with Caroline. Just like they used to.

* * *

Bonnie stayed a couple days, and when she left, she promised to visit Caroline soon.

Over the next few days, Caroline was told the story of what had happened while she'd been kidnapped, and she shyly thanked each of the Mikaelsons for their part in rescuing her.

She still didn't know what to do in regards to Klaus. Her monster approved of her mate, but she wasn't sure what to think about him when they were alone. She knew he was ridiculously attractive and that she felt drawn to him, and with the way he looked at her, sometimes she thought that he felt the same way.

But attraction was not love, and she knew that there was no love between them.

_But could there be?_

She was scared to find out.

"Why are you here?" She finally whispered one night.

He was quiet for a moment before he finally responded, "I've waited a thousand years and then some for you, love."

"And you killed me anyways."

"I can't change the past," he murmured, reaching out to trail his finger down the frame of her face. "And I won't apologize for breaking my curse. My regrets are few, and I do regret that it was you. Tell me, little love, how can I acquit myself?"

"I don't want to hurt anymore," she whispered tearfully.

"Then let me take the pain away, for now." He responded, gently brushing his lips against hers, testing and teasing. When she didn't stop him, he kissed her harder.

She let him, and as they fell into bed together, his wolf howled its approval.

* * *

Klaus woke up languidly, feeling oddly rested in a way that he hadn't experienced in ages.

He looked over to his side, to the empty spot and the crumpled sheets, and the events of the previous evening came crashing down on him.

_Caroline had let him mark her, had accepted him._

She had been warm and wet, flushed and willing. Eager. Being joined together with his mate was an experience that he had only begun to test the depths of.

And now she was gone, the only proof of her being there being the lingering traces of her scent on the sheets.

Fury rose in his veins first, followed by the icy cold thought that one of his enemies might have dared to steal her from right beneath his nose.

But before he could follow up on his thoughts, he saw the note on his nightstand.

_Thank you for last night. I don't know what we have, but I'm not ready for eternity yet, and I don't know how to move forward from this. I need to figure this out for myself. Please don't follow me. I guess I'll see you around. -Caroline_

* * *

His siblings ran into her, on occasion. She and Rebekah went shopping in Milan, and they went to the Paris Fashion Show together. Kol dragged her into some mischief in New Zealand. She ran into Elijah at a technology conference in New York, and Finn and Sage on a scuba diving expedition in Australia.

He couldn't help but notice that she never stepped foot in Louisiana.

He didn't see her again for fifty years, but she sent postcards. They arrived in random intervals, and they were always from a city or town that she was visiting. She never wrote anything on them, but they were always addressed to him. He knew they were from her.

It wasn't that he didn't know where she was the entire time – she still wore the spelled bracelet that made her untraceable to all other witches, but he could sense her presence due to their soulmate bond and his wolf's mark.

But she was no longer hiding from him.

When he finally saw her again, he'd been in Thailand, seeking out a powerful shaman who turned out to be quite reclusive and evasive. After a fruitless search and a waste of a day, that very evening, a rather grumpy shaman showed up outside his hotel room, muttering about a beautiful blonde vampire. At the mention of Caroline, Klaus looked up, and at the edge of his vision, he saw a pair of familiar ocean-blue eyes watching him. When he blinked, she was gone.

When Kol was cursed by witches, the Mikaelsons sought to find the coven who dared to come after one of their own, to make them pay. The next day, thirteen hearts arrived in boxes, along with instructions for the counter-curse, delivered to their doorstep. The delivery box had no return address, but it was sealed with a wax seal with a simple "C" in a filigree frame on it.

He heard through Marcel that a group of vampire hunters discovered what they believed to be a white oak sapling. Days later, they were killed, their hearts torn out. The white oak sapling had been burned to ash and ground to dust, the entire forest set ablaze and the ground salted. The hunters' bodies had been left in a pile for their comrades to discover.

There were whispers in the supernatural world, of a baby vampire with barely a century under her belt making waves. It appeared that Caroline Forbes was finally building an empire and making a name for herself, and she had chosen to side with the Originals.

* * *

It had been nearly two hundred years since he first killed her when Caroline showed up at his doorstep one day, in New Orleans.

"Hello love," he greeted her politely, curiosity stirring underneath his skin.

"Why me?" She asked without preamble. "We're soulmates, but you don't love me."

"You don't love me either." He calmly pointed out, but he obliged her. "The soulmate bond is what brought us together, but it doesn't lay the foundation for a relationship. I'm drawn to you, as you are to me. Aren't you the least bit curious as to what could happen?"

Her expression was unreadable as she quietly responded, "Are you?"

He flashed a dimpled smile at her. "I've wanted you from the moment I saw the light leave your eyes when I first killed you, Caroline. I wanted to find you when I learned that you had somehow survived, but you already were gone by then. I've spent nearly two hundred years watching you run."

She swallowed, a familiar steely glint in her eye as she said, "I didn't want you to chase me. I won't be a pawn in anyone's game, not even yours."

He tilted his head to the side, studying her. "What would be the point in chasing after you when you were so stubborn in your denial, little love?"

"I'm tired of running." She whispered.

"Would you like to come in?" He asked, gesturing inside.

She tentatively took a step forward, pausing in front of him as she murmured, "I guess. It's my birthday, after all."

Her heart beat rapidly in her chest, and there was a low stirring in her stomach at the way a slow, tantalizing smile spread on his face, emphasizing his dimples as he gently closed the door behind them.

_They had to start somewhere._

* * *

**_FIN._ **


End file.
